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Yesterday at conferences, a number of parents remarked that I was their child’s favorite teacher, “even though” I’m remote. For context, I’ve been teaching remotely to in-person students due to a preexisting health condition...
...while I’d love to believe that I’m just that good, I think that’s unlikely. I work with some VERY talented colleagues. Instead, I found myself wondering if maybe the fact that I was remote was actually making it easier for me to connect with my students...
...After all, my students are able to see my whole stupid face every day. They see me laugh and smile. Could this be enabling a more personal connection than I would have if I were in person and my face was behind a mask?...
...Additionally, am I maybe a better teacher than I would be in-person because I’m not weighed down by the stress and anxiety of in-person learning during a pandemic? And does that make me more amiable? Does it give me more emotional bandwidth to be available to my students?...
...I don’t have the answers to these questions, but I do think pondering them is worthwhile, especially as the push towards in-person learning becomes more and more aggressive...
...I think we are quick to scrutinize remote learning as parents because it is visible—we can see all the warts and wrinkles, so we feel responsible for fixing them in a way that we wouldn’t if our kids were in person, so instead, we’d rather the problems were out of sight...
...I guess what I’m saying is that there are benefits and drawbacks to both learning forms. And regardless of what decision you make, that’s important to keep that in mind. When we go back in-person, we will certainly gain some things, but we will lose others as well.
